NO

Let me speak plainly: 2020 is not the year for buttercream.

I see you, Swiss meringue buttercream with your ostentatious, sweet swooshes and swirls. (Show off.) No, a smattering of edible flowers, sea salt or sprinkles doesn’t tempt me.

What I need right now is simplicity and comfort. I need an uncomplicated slice of delicious homemade cake, in its purest form: still warm from the oven.

Who has the patience to wait for cakes to cool? Or the bandwidth for an offset spatula? Culinary fatigue is real. Covid-era cakes need to be busted out with minimal fuss. I’m talking two bowls and a whisk, and having that cake in my mouth and yours in less than an hour.

Lockdown has liberated me from all the snickety baking rules, and I’m sure as hell not icing a cake. I’m living on the edge and loving cutting all corners. I’m baking like Bill Murray when he lost his will to live in the film “Groundhog Day.” You know why? I’m on day 187. I’m still in my pajamas. I’m Zoomed out and tired of parenting.

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Why would I spend another half-hour in the kitchen investing in a topping when there’s no one to impress? Who would I seduce with luscious licks of sweet butter?

With a killer recipe like this one for Chocolatey Chocolate Cake, you don’t need a frosting. The magic is in the ridiculously moist, decadent but not too rich crumb. If you’re still on the fence about naked cakes, this will make up your mind. Simply dust the cake generously with confectioners’ sugar and save those other calories for booze. That way you can have your cake and cocktail too. —Odette Williams

YES

Photo: Nicole Franzen

When I was a kid, I developed a very specific technique for eating cupcakes. Unlike my peers, who would bite into the frosting and the cake together or lick the icing clean off the top before tackling (or abandoning) the cake underneath, I would peel off the wrapper, hold the unsheathed cake in my hand, and nibble carefully from the bottom up until all I had was an undisturbed cap of frosting held together by the thinnest layer of cake. Then I’d eat away at the creamy, sugary mass until it lost its shape and became a blob of crumbs and goo. It was the culinary equivalent of racing across a suspension bridge that’s come untethered—collapse was inevitable. Convoluted as it was, it was worth it. I was saving the best for last, and the best part of a cake, obviously, is the frosting.

In “The Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets,” Geraldene Holt writes, “Although a plain cake should still taste superb, it is often the icing on the cake that identifies it.” Exactly. Frosting transforms a vanilla cake into the platonic ideal of birthday cake, devil’s food into an iconic Duncan Hinesian wonder and carrot cake into one of the great American confections. Naked cake is the base; frosting is the clothing and therefore the identity.

Not only does frosting give each cake a unique character, it also serves key gastronomic functions. As my opposing debater, Odette Williams, points out in her book “Simple Cake,” frosting adds flavor, moisture, texture and, yes, beauty. A cake without frosting is like spaghetti without sauce or a hot dog without a bun. You can separate them, sure. But why would you want to? —Gabriella Gershenson

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